Author. Walker. Badass.

grief

You might have noticed something. I haven’t been blogging as much lately. I know it has been weird not to see a blog or two every week. And now it is time to confess to you why. You deserve to know. You read the words I put on here and never judge me, so it is time for you to understand why. I recently sat down with the Boss Bean and she convinced me to tell you all. It may not be funny. It may make you cry. But this is who I am. I put myself out here just as you see me. If ever you meet me in person, you will realize one thing…that this blog is exactly like having a conversation with me. So let’s have a conversation. A confession of sorts. Let’s have a confession of a Fat Girl.

Life for me has not been funny. It really has not. In fact, it has been rather traumatic. I have had a hell of a past 6 months and I tried not to talk about it but let me do a recap: I lost three family members in three months, BFF found a lump in her breast and had to have surgery twice and my Mommy took a horrible fall and ended up in the ICU and then a rehab facility for broken bones. To say my life has not been funny or cheerful is an understatement. I tried to shield you all from how I was feeling but I am not going to now. The last six months made me sad and angry. Losing my BFF’s Grandpa and our sweet Mathew really threw me for a loop. Never have I experienced grief like that. Never have I cried so much. Throw on top worrying if BFF had cancer (she does not) and spending a week with my Mom in a hospital, then you get the stressed out, crying and not so funny Fat Girl. I sat in front of my computer time after time trying to find words to write and ending up shutting it because the words would not come. I didn’t know what to say to you through my tears so I said nothing at all. I ate my feelings and gained a bunch of weight and sat here thinking there is no way you all want to be inspired by the ramblings of a depressed Fat Girl who eats her feelings. I am wrong. You need to see me like this. You need to see me laying on my couch, piles of snacks around me, doing nothing but watching Netflix and reality TV. This is what a traumatic six months will do to me. It makes me fat. It makes me want to hide in my house and not people. It makes me unmotivated, eat a lot of crap and cry. A lot.

Losing Mathew and Grandpa were harder than I thought. Even now, as I sit here and write all these words, tears are flowing down my face. I never realized how hard grief is and how I cope with it. I cope with it by eating. No exercising and eating. Grief and stress are funny things. So to say I gave up my eating plan and quit exercising is a hard thing to admit to you but I did. I really did eat my feelings. I didn’t think you would want to hear how sad I have been. How stressed life made me. How when I sat down to write it made me stressed out. I couldn’t express how I was feeling or make it funny and it stressed me out. So instead, I said nothing. I wrote nothing and that was not fair to you. I have had some fun times and to write about them felt weird. It felt like a lie. I am not going to lie to you, my readers. My life really has sucked for a while and you deserve to hear it. Everyone has times in their lives where it feels like you are at the bottom of a pit screaming and no one can hear your cries for help. Where you paste on a smile to the world and meanwhile inside you are screaming and crying and just want to be held. That was me for a long time. I felt like all I could do was tread the waters of life and keep my head just above so I wouldn’t drown. It was an awful feeling. Being an adult sucks. It really does.

Finally, I realized after talking with Boss Bean and BFF that all I needed to do was to sit here and confess to you how shitty my life has been. I can look back on it now and laugh and make fun of some situations, but before I really could not find the laughter. I could not find the words to tell you that I wanted someone to make it all better. For someone to tell me it would be ok. For me to not have to paste on a fake smile. I wanted to scream in anger. I was angry. I was mad at God, the world, the circumstances. Why would God take Grandpa and then Mathew? Why would he throw so much grief and stress at me all at once? Work suffered. My writing suffered. My weight suffered. But you know what? I made it through. I am still here. All of this may have made me silent for a while but I am still here. Here I am in all my glory… fatter and sassier. I finally was able to reach deep down into that pit and pull out my voice. I grabbed a hold of those words and lifted them to the top, allowing those feelings to wash over me and my fingers to put them on the page for you. Yes, my life was so shitty and traumatic for the past 6 months. Yes, I ate every bit of those feelings and now have to deal with that. Yes, I am still here and ready to put more words to the page for you. This is my confession and I am glad you are still here too.

Oh yeah. I didn’t die today. I lost my voice and my words in grief and anger, but I didn’t die. I am the Fat Girl who CAN survive and eats my feelings Running. The experiment continues…

Like this:

I realize it has been quite a while since you heard from me and there is a really good explanation. Hopefully you read about the loss of BFF’s Grandpa right before the holidays but in January, we had a devastating loss of her 23-year-old nephew, Mathew as well. BFF and I have been best friends for over 20 years and her family has adopted me as another member, with her brothers calling me their other sister and her nieces and nephews calling me Aunty 2. So, when we got the news Matty had died in a horrible car wreck, I was devastated right along with the rest of the family. You see, I had known Matty since he was little and I loved being his Aunty 2. It was so hard to think about writing and words could not seem to come to me to even begin to express my grief over such a young soul. But this week, as I was musing over Matty and how he lived his life, the words he lived by inspired me. Live Grand.

Matty may have only been 23 years old, but the life he lived was so full and rich. We like to say he lived life going mach 3 with his hair on fire, but really he just lived grand. He LOVED adventure. This kid ran river tours in the Grand Canyon with the Hualapai tribe for many years and they loved him so much he was actually made a member of the tribe. He loved to take chances and was a budding photographer, doing anything to get the perfect shot. So many photos of Matty not only show his beautiful smile but they also show him on the edge of cliffs, playing in the Colorado river, snowboarding down the mountain and many other things that made his life grand. He loved spending time with the family, never missing a function if he could help it and was always the first one to take selfies with everyone. His laugh and smile were contagious and you could forgive him of any transgression by that smile and he knew it. This spirit, this essence of Matty is his legacy. to all of us. This sense of loving life and living outside the box is what inspires me. This is where my challenge to you, my dear readers, is going to present itself. In memory of BFF and my nephew, I challenge you to Live Grand.

BFF and Matty That smile….

Take a moment and reflect on your life and what makes it grand. Find one thing that you can do to make it more rich, fuller and bursting with life. Whether that be traveling to a new destination, creating your own adventure or even just spending more time with your family, find that one thing and do it. Do not wait until tomorrow or put it off to next year, I want you to do it now. Matty wants you to do it now. Plan it, execute it and make your life grand. It’s that simple. This is my challenge to all of you…to keep Matty’s spirit alive and make your life grand. I want you to tag me in posts on Facebook, Instagram and even send me snapchats with the hashtag #LiveGrand and show me how you can change your life to make it your best life ever. I want to see you #LiveGrand no matter what that means to you. Show me! I plan on spending more time with my family and traveling more to make my life grand. Because if there is one thing Matty taught me, it was that family is not always about blood. It is about those people who love and support you the most and BFF and her family are some of those people. Thank you BFF and her family. You all have given me something I cherish….your love.

This boy….

Mathew. I am proud to have been your Aunty 2. I am glad you never hesitated to tell me you loved me. I am proud to have known you and been blessed by your smile, laugh and your love. I am so proud of the man you had become and I will miss you my sweet nephew. While I will never hear you call me Aunty 2 again and get some random snapchat from you showing me your smile, I will always love you. You lived grand in life and now you can continue to Live Grand forever. “Through every door, a new path awaits.” Enjoy your new path Matty. And #LiveGrand.

Mathew Thomas Reyes 1993-2017 #LiveGrand

Oh yeah. I didn’t die today. I did discover that even through great grief, you can discover a new joy in life but I didn’t die. Thank you Matty. I am Fat Girl who is going to #LiveGrand Running. The experiment continues…